Schroeder attacks poll rival

Stoiber: Bavarian leader who believes Schroeder is weak on immigration

BERLIN, Germany -- German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has issued a warning that the conservatives' candidate to face him in forthcoming elections will "polarise" society.

He said the Christian Democrats, whose leader Angela Merkel stood aside on Friday for Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber, had given up part of its identity by picking as its candidate the leader of its more conservative sister party in Bavaria.

Schroeder said Stoiber, the leader of the Christian Social Union, wanted to return Germany to the era of former Chancellor Helmut Kohl, who his Social Democrats ousted in 1998.

"A Stoiber candidacy will polarise society," Schroeder told Der Spiegel magazine.

"He stands for the radicalisation of the democratic right and thereby sacrifices the centre ground."

MORE STORIES Profile: Edmund Stoiber  Profile: Gerhard Schroeder

He added: "He belongs to the top personnel of the Kohl era and that is exactly where he wants to get back to.

"Germans know that the standstill in the country was caused by those who are now staking their claim to power, Herr Stoiber included. The voters will not set a thief to catch a thief."

Schroeder said a move to the right was discernible in the conservatives' resistance to the immigration reforms his centre-left government is trying to pass, their opposition to the legalisation of gay marriages and the party's position on internal security.

He defended his government's record after three years in power, highlighting the tax and pension reforms it had passed and noting its commitment to cutting state borrowing, creating leeway for the European Central Bank to ease interest rates.

He admitted his goal of cutting unemployment to 3.5 million by the elections set for September 22 would not be reached, but said the global economic downturn was largely to blame. German unemployment is expected to surpass four million this winter.

"Nobody can dispute that even before September 11 we already had a clouding over of the global economy," he said.

In his first interview after Merkel stepped aside, broadcast on Sat-1 TV, Stoiber said: "Schroeder's policies are leading the country the wrong way. Because of bad policies, Germany is in an economic decline.

"(We have) the lowest growth in Europe and four million unemployed. Germany's place as a leading industrial power is endangered."

Merkel pledged to throw the full weight of her CDU party behind Stoiber "so that the chances for victory we have at the start of this year also become a reality."

"Together with Edmund Stoiber, I will make my contribution," she told a news conference.

Schroeder's own popularity has slipped during the past month on the back of an economic downturn and rising unemployment have seen ratings for his Social Democrats slip from 41 percent to 39 percent, a poll by the Electoral Research Group for ZDF televitelevision.